Love Is Love: Lin-Manuel Miranda Official Merch Is in Solidarity With Orlando Victims

All profits will benefit the LGBTQ community in Florida

“Love is Love” T-shirt to benefit the Florida LGBTQ community Photo by Tee-Rico

“Hello everyone. This is Lin-Manuel Miranda–”

These are the words every Hamilton-obsessed, ticket lottery playing, Broadway fanatics dream of hearing every time we open the email that unfortunately says, “Unfortunately, you were not selected to receive tickets”.

Instead, those words are encapsulated in a letter from Miranda. “This is Lin-Manuel Miranda’s officially-licensed merchandise site.”

Miranda gave an empowering speech, or rather a sonnet, at the most recent Tony Awards in which he paid tribute to the victims of the Orlando nightclub shooting. As he repeated the phrase “love is love”—for a total of 9 ‘love’s—the cheers in the audience got louder.

While indicating the release of additional products, Miranda writes, “But right now, the tragedy in Orlando is more important than everything else. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims and their families and we want to help.”

Working with Broadway Cares, Miranda launches the site with the sale of his “Love is Love” t-shirt, the profit from which will go to the LGBTQ community in Florida. Taking words from his sonnet, the shirt, which costs $29.00, reads “Love cannot be killed or swept aside…Now fill the world with music, love and pride,” and on the back quotes simply, “Love is love is love is love is love is love”. He also personally signs off “Siempre, Lin-Manuel Miranda” in a scrawl of a handwritten signature.

In an even more proactive measure, Miranda uses Nightsweats & T-Cells for the printing of his product, which he says have used a staff comprised completely with HIV employees.

This is the most recent effort for Orlando stemming from the Broadway community, which recently announced a We Are the World-esque recording of Jackie DeShannon’s hit “What the World Needs Now is Love” jam-packed with celebrities.

Miranda tweeted out the link yesterday morning to his 533K followers with the message “So here’s a thing that speaks for itself. I’m very excited about it and it’s a way you can help.” The responses seemed to validate his message of support.